


World Turns

by cecilantro



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Spoilers, Spoilers for Episode 45
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-14
Updated: 2018-12-14
Packaged: 2019-09-18 02:09:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 944
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16986138
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cecilantro/pseuds/cecilantro
Summary: You showed meThat I need hopeThat I need changeTo know how it feels to be aloneHow does it feel to be alone- Secondhand Serenade, World TurnsBeau is not the best person to be fixing today.





	World Turns

**Author's Note:**

> nyoom sanic

“Hey,” Beau buffets Clay’s shoulder gently and masks the smirk as he gives a yelp of shocked pain, “Could you- uh- could you keep an eye out? Just for a bit? I got somethin’ I need t’ see to. ‘Cause I know fine fuckin’ well Fjord isn’t gonna.”

“Yeah,” Clay already knows, already understands, “Take as long as you need. I’m nocturnal.”

It’s not entirely true- technically, Firbolg are crepuscular, but his sleep rhythm is so fucked now that it won’t bother him. Beau pats his shoulder in affectionate thanks, and makes her way into the belly of the ship.

 

She passes Caleb’s room first and- and- she _really_ wants to check on him. She’s worried. He’s her friend. Her brother. She loves him- but his time is with Nott, and she knows inherently that behind that closed, locked door, Caleb is awake, Nott is asleep, wound in a ball against his chest on one ratty bed with a blanket thrown over them.  
She wants to check on him. She wants to make it better.  
She knows that she cannot.

Best leave that one for Clay come morning.

So she continues down the hall- Fjord’s room is open, he’s face-down on his bed, snoring. Beau is unsurprised, he had been so tired, so- in every way, physical, mental, he had refused to leave Jester then, yet he leaves her now, when he can do the most.  
When all he needs to do is go and sit with her, lie with her, sleep at her side and know she is alive, be known, but he won’t.  
  
Maybe he’s too stubborn.  
Maybe he’s too stupid.

Maybe it’s both.

All Beau knows for sure is that Fjord is here, and Jester is in her room, probably awake and crying and there is nobody with her and _Godsdammit,_ Beau will not let Jester be on her own again. She has been alone long enough.

 

Beau almost barges straight in to Jester’s quarters, but she forces herself to wait, knocking lightly and halting and shivering in anticipation of permission.

“Yeah?” Jester’s voice comes thickly through the door, stuffy, she is in tears.

“S’me?” Beau tries, hears a snuffle,

“Is something wrong?” There is no movement from Jester’s side of the door, Beau shifts from foot to foot,

“Yeah. Yeah, somethin’s wrong. Can I come in?”

It may be the most tactful that Beau has ever been, she waits, she waits for a reply and then gets a soft, sad, broken, “ _Okay,_ ” and opens the door.

 

Jester is a mess. Her dress is torn and blood spatters in, singed, tears track through the soot on her face and she’s sniffing to stop her nose running, one hand smoothing across the tears in her clothes as she tries to mend them.

“What’s wrong?”

“Ah, Jessie…” Beau’s face twists, she feels herself closing her eyes without meaning to and takes a deep breath, a deep sigh, “Just. We’ll deal with that in the mornin’, for now just. Strip down. I’ll get y’ one of the shirts we bought Yasha to sleep in.”

The ones she’s never worn.  
Huh.  
Beau hasn’t seen the barbarian since they got back.

Jester bursts into tears.

“I’m fine,” she tries to reassure through sobs and Beau comes to sit beside her, pulling her into an awful, awkward hug but there’s a terrible ache in her chest when she sees Jester cry. Jester is not supposed to cry. Jester is supposed to be happy.

“Yeah, alright. You’re fine. Okay. Can I take your dress off?”

Her fingers slip over the ribbon corset ties at the back, some singed, mostly intact and Jester nods against her shoulder before pausing,

“You’re not trying to seduce me, are you?”

“Not tonight.” Beau promises, and receives a watery chuckle in return.

 

Beau’s lesbian quickness grants her a strange proficiency in undressing women.

She undoes the ties to Jester’s dress one-handed, the two of them stand together so that Beau can ease Jester out of it, leaving her in her breast band and underwear and Beau can think of little more to do. She shrugs off the pale mint of her outer coat and strips her own shirt off, tugging it over Jester’s head and horns instead, a little small and snug but long enough that it helps.  
And then they collapse back to the thin mattress.

“I’m fine,” Jester tries to placate through tears, “I’m alright.”

They are both no longer sure whether Jester is lying to herself, or to Beau.

“Alright.” Beau tries her most soothing voice, she has learned a lot in the past few… hours? Days? “Alright. Go t’ sleep, Jessie.”

“Call me that again.” Jester wriggles in toward her, winding around her like the frumpkin-octopus and tucking her head under Beau’s chin.

“Jessie?” Beau tries, and is squeezed for her accurate guesses, “Everythin’ will be better in th’ mornin’. Caduceus is makin’ breakfast. Go t’ sleep, Jessie, I- I- uh. I’m here.”

“Beau…” Jester draws out, but her voice is sleepy, tear-laden, thick. “Beau.”

 

Jester lies broken in Beau’s arms.

 

Caleb lies awake, curled around his dearest friend, someone he very nearly lost.

 

Fjord does not think, does not dream, does not ache.

 

Clay keeps his sharp eyes on the horizon in search of the absentee barbarian, fleeing over hills in her calling to the Stormlord, in search of the tiny gnome that had likely both saved and endangered their lives. In search of friends, freedom, a new hope.

 

The Mighty Nein lay fractured across their broken dreams, and the ball lies dormant on the table.

 

_Click._

_Click._

_Click._

_C-lick._

 

A lullaby for those it had almost killed.


End file.
